


(to say nothing of the Grimm)

by Metronomeblue



Series: life is hard enough [1]
Category: Grimm (TV)
Genre: Adalind and Lauren are not off to a great start, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, And Adalind and Meisner have... something, Cupcake Girl is probably Satan lbh here, European Supernatural Power Politics, F/M, Fix-It, Grimm societies, Grimms outside of America, Kelly is a bad travel companion, Meisner and Sebastien have an epic bromance, Other Grimms, Reaper politics regarding Grimms, Renard is slightly miffed at being left out of the bromance, Renard knows the cool people, Sebastien Lives, Sebastien has some kick-ass friends, Sebastien is a shitty patient, So many Grimms in this world, Somewhere in Thailand there's a tiny Grimm who runs a homeless shelter, patronage, tags to be updated, the hundjager convention is a thing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-04
Updated: 2015-10-01
Packaged: 2018-04-07 14:33:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4266804
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Metronomeblue/pseuds/Metronomeblue
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Once upon a time, events proceeded differently.</p><p>A well-timed interjection, a group of hundjagers with horrible job security, a Grimm with unanticipated discretion, a Resistance that mostly consists of running away and plotting, and a Reaper with a few unwanted secrets...</p><p>And no happily ever after to save them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. other ways to live (and die)

**Author's Note:**

> I'm a sucker for fix-it fic. Also, Sebastien. And ho-lee SHIT did this get away from me.

"Here," Sebastien said, reaching for the gun. "Give that to me." Meisner grew, if possible, even more agitated, handing it to him. Sebastien pulled, but Martin's fingers only clenched around it more tightly. Adalind checked the rear view mirror.

"There's no need," he said quietly. "You've done your best." The other's face twisted with self-loathing.

"My best," he choked out. "I've destroyed what little honor I had left." Despite the pain the effort cost him, he wrenched the gun from Martin's grip. "I refuse to live like that." Adalind slid smoothly out of the car, hushing her baby.

"You don't have to." Sebastien shook his head, already turning back to Viktor's car. "There are other ways to die."

"And other ways to live." Both men turned to her, equal expressions of confusion writ upon their faces. She sent them a crooked smile. "Redemption takes more than a final stand. Wouldn't it be better to just come with us?" Martin sent an expectant look towards his friend. Sebastien looked down at the gun, then back to Meisner and Adalind.

"If I must," he said wearily, allowing Meisner to help him back into the back seat.

"You must," Meisner said softly, settling the bloodied man.

The road to their contact was long, and by nightfall Adalind and the baby had both fallen asleep. Meisner had driven the whole way, but found it difficult to keep his mind off of his beaten friend, who despite all odds had remained alert since they had first left. Sebastien had always struck him as being deeply steadfast, and despite a profound difference in character and purpose, Martin had found himself liking the smaller man. He had never suspected his loyalties ran quite so deep, nor that betraying those loyalties would drive him to suicide. He made a note to thank Adalind for her extraordinarily well-timed remark the next time he had a moment, because if Sebastien had stayed there was no doubt in Martin's mind that he would have died.

"Thank you, mon ami," Sebastien said suddenly, so quietly Martin wouldn't have heard it in any other circumstance. He caught the man's eye in the mirror.

"C'est pas," he replied.

Nothing, indeed.

~*~

Far from that car, which was moving swiftly towards Switzerland, Viktor and his men returned to their own vehicles, engine blocks laden with bullets and backseat   
mysteriously relieved of its frenchman-shaped burden.

"Damn," Viktor hissed through his teeth, motioning towards a hundjager to dial some help. "Find her."

"Miss Schade?" A hundjager asked timidly.

"No," Viktor said, leaning forwards so that his hands were flat against the glass. "Find the spy's accomplice. He had to have one. He wasn't alone in working for my cousin."

"Do you have an idea, sir?" Danilov asked, sweeping forward like some bat out of an elementary school's theatrical production of Dracula. "Of who the accomplice is?"

Viktor closed his eyes in response to the infinite pain caused by the stupidity of his men.

"The visitor. From last week." The hundjagers looked at each other. Their predecessors had been killed on Monday. They had only been working there for three days. "His only visitor?" They stared at him with mildly apologetic expressions. Viktor sighed. The hundjagers shrugged.

He straightened, smile growing on his face as if finding new purpose in making Sebastien's life miserable.

"We'll capture her, force their destination out of her." The hundjagers nodded, privately agreeing it would be easier and more accurate to simply track the car instead. "Excellent," Viktor grinned.

The hundjagers agreed amongst themselves that this was not overly excellent.

~*~

 

They stopped for the night on a dirt road, just hidden from the main highway. Once Meisner had pulled over, Sebastien commandeered his cell to call somebody whose name he refused to reveal.

Adalind and Martin shared a glance at this. He had taken a few steps away from the car, but he spoke clearly enough that they could hear.

"C'est moi. Non, je ne peut pas parler longtemps." A pause. "Je vais bien. Non, c'est vrai." He turned back to the car, scanning both of their faces. "Ce n'est pas non plus d'ils." He nodded, a small smile making it's way onto his bruised and tired face. "Moi aussi." Whoever it was on the other end hung up, and he stood for a moment, looking at the phone, before returning slowly to the car. It was obvious to both his companions that something Viktor had done to him was paining him terribly, but he refused all help.

"Merci," he said, handing the phone back to Martin. "That was much needed."

Martin nodded, and Adalind sent him a shaky smile before hushing the child who had just begun to wail. After a moment of discussion, Adalind went to fetch a blanket from the trunk in order to feed the child. The bitter cold reached them even through the metal and glass of the car, and it wouldn't help anyone if one of them got sick. Especially the child, given the potential psychic consequences of prolonged discomfort.

Martin turned to Sebastien, fully intent on ascertaining the identity of his mysterious friend, only to find the man asleep and slumped across the backseat.

Adalind returned, blanket in hand. She took a look at their quiet companion and smiled.

"Well at least he's finally resting," she said, and Martin rolled his eyes. After spending around ten hours watching Sebastien scan every passing car for any sign of the Verrat, it _was_ nice to see him relaxed.

~*~

She hung up the phone, smile quickly fading. She set it down on the table, walking to the window of her hotel room. Gazing down at Austria with an unsettled gaze, she chewed her lip.

Somebody had screwed up. Something had given them away. She knew it wasn't Meisner or Adalind- neither of them would be so foolish as to tell the Royals what they were about to do. She knew Renard wouldn't be that opaque, either.

It could have been Stefania. It could have been Pech, for all she knew. Hexenbiests were... difficult when it came to true death, after all. She sighed, striding back to the table to scoop up her phone, then proceeding out the door to the stairway. Hearing the door slam shut behind her, she dialled the only other number in the phone.

"Captain? Yes, just recently." She nodded, staring down the spiral of railing. "They're over the line, I know that much. Somebody talked. None of the three, I'm sure of that much." She bit her lip, looking back over her shoulder. "I'll meet them at the airfield. Yes. Be safe." She hung up. Staring down at the screen of the phone, she rubbed a thumb over it before removing the SIM card and tossing it handily down the center of the stairwell.

The cracking noise satisfied her a little, but the knowledge that Viktor wouldn't be able to find her was even better.

~*~

"Sir, we've found her." Viktor turned away from his velvet curtains at the sound of his henchman's voice. "She said her name was L, but we've used the signature to track her to the Petit Mensonge Hotel."

Viktor nodded. "And the name she used there?"

"Irene Castulus, sir." Viktor grinned.

"Then perhaps we have her."

They made their way to the Petit Mensonge, the hunjagers murmuring worriedly the whole way. Once they arrived, Viktor began interrogating the desk girl as to who exactly Irene Castulus was, and which room she stayed in, and why she might have used a false name.

"I've no idea," the desk girl said. "I just check them in and out."

Viktor, somewhat frustrated already, was not mollified by the answers he found in room 316. One hundjager found a broken burner phone at the end of the stairwell, while another found an empty glass on the bedside table, but there was otherwise no indicator that anyone had stayed there at all.

"Sir," one hundjager profferred the burner phone like a peace offering. Viktor took one look at it and sighed.

"But why these particular pseudonyms?" He asked, pacing the length of the room. "Why use one letter at the palace, and a different name at the hotel?" He looked up at the gaping crack in the plaster ceiling. "Why this hotel? Le Petit Mensonge? As if I didn't already know she was lying to me." The hundjagers shrugged.

"Irene Castulus." Viktor sniffed, "It almost sounds familiar."

~*~

She booked a train ticket under the same name she'd used at the hotel. Viktor would hardly expect her to use the same name twice, after all. Irene Castulus had made contact with a pilot in the Laufer, and now she was headed to the primary airfield in Bern, from which they would depart for the trio in Zurich, and from there head to whatever destination Renard had chosen.

But first, the train.

There was the ticket collector, the verification process, and perhaps most dangerous of all, her fellow passengers.

"Billet, mademoiselle?" She handed it to him with a small smile. The middle-aged couple across from her glared. The ticket collector was young, decently attractive and rather attentive. She ignored him utterly. They glared harder. He asked if she wanted any help, and she replied no. Their glares could potentially pin her to a wall if they were so inclined.

She sighed and looked out the window. The glares did not abate.

"Are you blind?" The man barked, revealing his Americanness with little to no effort.

"Non," she replied airily, hoping her accent was good enough to convince them to leave her alone.

"Deaf?" He followed up with.

She blinked at him, unimpressed.

"Single?" His wife croaked, like a wooden door that hasn't been opened in years.

"Non," she replied flatly. Their glares continued to prickle her, and she began to suspect that it was simply their default expression.

She refused to stoop to their level. She didn't look away from the window. The tall, city buildings slowly blending into shorter, darker houses, eventually turning into trees and hills. She twisted the chain around her neck and thought about the plane trip and the destination she still didn't know.

She hoped it was cold.

~*~

 

Adalind's baby, Meisner decided, was the best alarm clock he'd ever had. Every morning, exactly as the sun crested the trees, the damn thing began to cry, rousing them all from their sleep so that they could attend to its comfort. It was, he had discovered, somewhat like Adalind in this regard.

"Are you awake?" She asked, reaching out to tentatively poke his forehead. "Hey."

"I am very awake," he muttered, head still pressed into the steering wheel. "Leave me alone." She retracted her finger, but after a moment poked him again.

"You're not much of a morning person, are you?" He sighed, straightening up with no small amount of wincing.

"Morning, for me, does not begin until seven." Adalind blinked, unimpressed.

"Stop flirting," Sebastien interjected in what had to be the most lackluster joke in history. It was actually somewhat worrying.

But they did. Stop flirting.

For about thirty seconds.

"Will we get there today?" Adalind asked, rocking the alarm clock back to sleep.

"I believe so," Martin said, checking on Sebastien in the mirror.

"Do you know who we're meeting?" Martin shook his head.

"Renard set it up. He wouldn't send anyone he didn't think was capable."

Sebastien began to make efforts to sit up straight.

"I know," he said, grimacing as he clutched his ribs. "There should be two women and the pilot." Adalind sent him a worried glance, but he just slumped forward instead of back and waved a hand at her. "Don't worry about me. Worry about him." She raised an eyebrow at Martin, who belatedly realized he was driving a good measure above the speed limit with his knuckles white against the wheel.

"I'm fine." Sebastien snorted.

"You sound like me."

~*~

They departed the airfield early, and the pilots were genial enough. She strapped herself into the seat closest to the cockpit, tapping her fingers constantly against her knees. It took an hour or so to get to the airfield outside of Zurich, and when they landed it looked deserted.

"Shouldn't the contacts be here?" The pilot asked, checking his watch.

"We have a few hours before the three get here," she told him, peering out the front window. "But she should be here soon, if she isn't already."

"Who?" The copilot asked, but the other two shook their heads.

"You'll see," she sighed, pushing off the back of their seats. The plane was small, but the supply hold was large enough to keep five people and a tiny child alive for a week. She counted the seats to keep herself calm. 18, 19, 20 seats, only five people and one baby. Two pilots, five people, one baby. Room enough.

"I'm going to go check the forest," she called to the two pilots, pulling her coat on. She threw out the stairs and made her way down, checking for movement in the field. There wasn't any, besides a few birds, and she wasn't sure if that made her feel better or worse.

A flicker in her peripheral vision made her stir. She blinked, taking in the wind, the light and the best cover positions to her right, before ducking and rolling into the brush. A bullet passed just over her, and she struck out with her leg, knocking the Verrat agent above her off his feet. He spun as he fell, and lunged back at her. A well-placed fist to his sternum knocked the air from his lungs, but his flailing arm scraped across her cheek. She was knocked back, and threw out her legs as he began to stand. Reaching out behind him, she threw herself forward. There was a odd strangled noise from him as she pulled a rope up under his chin. His hands immediately went to his throat, but she pulled the rope tightly enough to incapacitate him. She dropped him, wrapping the rope around her hand. He lay beside her for a moment, and she checked his pulse- thready but strong enough to leave.

"That was messy," a voice from behind her noted wryly. She smiled, turning.

"I don't kill everyone I meet," she teased, pulling her hair away from her face. The other woman stepped forward, cleaning blood off of a knife. "How are you, Kelly?"

"Been better," she said, frowning. "They knew we were here."

"Probably saw the plane," she shrugged. "There'll be more coming, too. Verrat like numbers."

"I'll deal with the other two back there if you take those three." She nodded, and Kelly tossed her the knife.

"We'll leave the next batch to Meisner, then?" She asked, pulling another knife from the body on the ground. The woman in black snorted, frisking the unconscious agent for more weapons.

"I'll give him half."

"Generous," she noted. "See you back in the plane." Kelly nodded, checking the clip in a pistol.

~*~

 

"Is this it?" Adalind asked, horror evident in her voice. Sebastien grinned weakly from the backseat.

"Of course not. He can't make it that easy for us." She looked at back at him, mouth still open.

"It's only a quarter-mile off," Meisner scowled, nodding in the direction of the open field. It was slightly visible through the trees, and they caught a glint of silver in the milky light. The clouds gathering above them promised turbulence, and Adalind shuddered, clutching the baby closer to her chest.

"'Only,' he says," Sebastien muttered good-naturedly, easing himself out of the backseat. Adalind snatched the blanket off of her seat and wrapped it around her shoulders. Martin tucked the keys under the front seat, then turned to check Sebastien, who was limping slowly after Adalind. She stopped a few paces ahead of him and waited for him to catch up, laughing at something he said. Sebastien's black eye had faded slightly, and the blood on his shirt had darkened to brown, but he still moved gingerly, despite his determination to do so without assistance.

He'd grown rather fond of them both, to be quite honest.

He closed the car door, then stalked off after them into the trees.

It took them longer than it should have, but Martin was alright with that because none of Sebastien's wounds had reopened and Adalind's baby hadn't started to cry at all. He felt they were doing rather well. Until, you know, the mass of Verrat enforcers suddenly appeared to ruin his thus-far acceptable day. Adalind began to sprint towards the plane, clutching her blanketed baby to her chest. Sebastien followed, at a far slower pace. Meisner dispatched the first few easily, then made his way around the clearing to finish the others. The appearance of a woman in black did not serve to calm him.

"She's with us," a voice from behind him called. A brunette in a blue coat and dark boots ducked out of the underbrush, wiping blood off of a knife. "That the last of them?" She asked the woman in black, who nodded and held up a hand. The brunette smirked and tossed her the knife. "Come on," she called, stepping over several bodies. "We need to move." Adalind and Sebastien were slumped against the side of the plane, covered by the wheel well, but when Sebastien caught sight of the woman in blue, his eyes widened.

"Lauren?" He called hopefully, forcing himself to stand. Her eyes grew wide, and a light possessed her face. She jogged the last few meters to fall to her knees with him.

"You said you were alright," she said reproachfully, running her hands gently over his face, taking particular care with his eye. He grimaced.

"I'm fine," he said, and Meisner got the definite impression that this had happened before. The woman in blue, who he assumed was Lauren, pulled Sebastien up with her while the woman in black herded Adalind toward the plane. The rag-tag group made their way to the stairs, where Meisner was waiting.

"Thank you so much," Adalind said, and then her lips were pressed, soft and warm to his cheek. He could feel the child in her arm, her hair blowing in the breeze, could smell her perfume on the collar of her coat. For a moment, he wanted-

"Come on, we have to move." The woman in black wasn't patient, and she wasn't going to wait for Martin to sort out his emotions.

"Farewell, mon ami," Sebastien rasped, reaching out one hand and keeping the other pressed to his side.

"Bon chance," Martin replied quietly, shaking his hand. Lauren nodded at Sebastien, who started up the stairs after Adalind, then turned back to Martin.

"Viktor may find you," she warned him abruptly. "He's good with hunting." She looked back at the dead Verrat in the trees. "He'll hunt you until you can't run anymore."

"I can run for a long time," Martin answered. She smiled and nodded once.

"I don't doubt that." She pressed an envelope into his hand. "This should tell you everything you need to know. I'll contact you soon regarding the Laufer."

He nodded, then took a glance at the stairs. "You'll take care of them?"

"I always do," she asid, and there was a strange warmth in her voice that he hadn't yet heard. She smiled at him, put her hand on his wrist, then turned to make her way back up the stairs.

He watched her pull the stairs up, watched the plane take off. The snow covered the Verrat in the trees, the imprint where the plane had landed, the footprints Adalind and Sebastien and Lauren had left. He took out his phone to call Renard.

"Bon chance," he murmured, watching the plane depart as the dial tone rang in his ear. "Bon chance, mes amis."


	2. everything is justified

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is kind of late, but I lost my chapter outline so it's also from scratch. Today we get: banter! pancakes! knives! and the introduction of cupcake girl!

 

The plane was quiet for a while. Adalind kept looking nervously out the window, rocking her baby as if her life depended on it. The woman in black was attentively cleaning her knives, the smell of oil and rubbing alcohol filling the small plane. The woman in blue, Lauren, had pulled Sebastien gently to the supply hold, where she quickly set about assessing his wounds.

"You told me you were alright," she repeated reproachfully.

"I am," he hissed, her fingers probing a broken rib.

"Far from it," she muttered, pulling a weighty first aid kit from the hold. "You've got at least two broken ribs, fluid in your lungs, severe strain to your left leg, abrasions to, well, everywhere, and several knife wounds to your chest and sides." She punctuated her remarks by opening the first aid kit, slamming bandages onto the bench. "You are the furthest thing from fine."

"Why didn't you tell us?" Adalind asked, stroking her baby's head. "You had to have been in so much pain..."

"Because he's a stubborn ass," Lauren said tartly, efficiently stripping him of his coat and shirt. It didn't escape Adalind, however, that she was neither harsh nor careless in her movements. She began cleaning a large wound in Sebastien's side, hands firm but gentle on his bloody skin.

"It wasn't important," he amended, catching the eye of the woman in black.

"She seems to think differently," she said, something in her tone telling Adalind this wasn't a new argument to her.

"Of course I think differently," Lauren snorted, threading a slim, curved needle with black nylon thread. "This isn't the first time you've gotten yourself hurt for Renard," she said to Sebastien, smoothly pulling the needle through his skin. "It's just the first time you refused to tell me." He winced, taking a deep breath before she made another stitch.

"I didn't intend to live long enough to tell _anyone_ ," he admitted sheepishly. She pulled another stitch, more tightly this time. The admission of his planned suicide sent a chill through Adalind. He had seemed so calm, so rational, that it was disquieting to hear him mention it.

"What if I just disappeared on you," Lauren asked roughly, hands moving quickly. "and you never heard from me again, except that last phone call, where I said I was fine?"

" _Lauren_ ," he said, half-shame and half-stubbornness. Adalind's child suddenly wailed, breaking the tense atmosphere and reminding Lauren that she had an audience.

"We'll talk later," she said quickly, tying off her second set of stitches. The woman in black was still pretending to be deeply absorbed in the cleanliness of her knives. Adalind apologized, standing to walk the length of the plane, rocking her baby the whole way. Lauren nodded and cleared her throat, letting her hair hide her face as she bent over Sebastien's injuries. The woman in black stood as well, strapping some of her knives back onto her belt and into her coat. "Want it back?" Lauren asked quietly, cleaning the blood away from his eye. She nodded, and Lauren reached around her waist to pull the knife from her pocket. The woman in black stood beside them for a moment, observing, thumb rubbing over the slope of knife's edge, where blood still dried.

"How long?" She asked, and Sebastien grimaced.

"Seven hours," he admitted, guilt leaking through and self-loathing rising like a tide.

"More than most," the woman in black consoled him, her tone only slightly warmer than before.

"So you all know each other?" Adalind asked suddenly, watching them intently.

"In a roundabout way," Sebastien told her, turning to address her and being forcefully turned back to Lauren, who sent him a chastising look and wiped more blood from his forehead. "Lauren and I are acquainted-"

"And we know each other," Lauren gestured between herself and the woman in black.

"However, _we_ have never met," Sebastien finished suspiciously, eyes narrowing on the woman in black.

"Kelly Burkhardt," she introduced herself tersely. Adalind made a strangled noise and shrank back against the wall. "What?" Kelly asked, raising an eyebrow.

"I was wondering about that," Lauren mused placidly. "You're a Grimm, she's a Hexenbiest- _how_ was that supposed to really work out?"

"You're going to kill me!" Adalind shrieked. Lauren rolled her eyes.

"Usually it's the other way around," she commented dryly, spreading first aid cream over Sebastien's black eye.

"Calm down," Kelly said coldly. "I'm not here to kill you."

"We're here because dear Captain Renard enlisted some Pro-Resistance friends to protect you," Lauren elaborated, beginning to clean the bench while Sebastien put his shirt back on, wincing the whole time. "Originally it was just meant to be a couple of Steinadlers, maybe a Hundjager- but I volunteered, and well, Kelly does _so_ hate to be left out."

"I wasn't that upset," Kelly said, straight-faced. Sebastien almost laughed, but started coughing at the last minute instead.

"You burned down my favorite patisserie!" Lauren reminded her, an incredulous smile breaking out on her face.

"Did I?" Kelly asked mildly. Adalind had stopped shaking in the corner.

"Anyway, we're here for you," Lauren told Adalind, tossing the first sid kit into supply hold. "Well, mostly Sebastien. But also you!" Adalind snorted, and Lauren's smile grew. She threw herself into the seat next to Sebastien, tossing her legs over his lap and lying down across four or five seats that could have otherwise held someone or something else. Sebastien, who was downing four painkillers, had initially made a sound like an upset cat but calmed when he realized who it was.

"So Adalind, tell us about yourself," Lauren invited, spreading her hands. "The plane ride's going to take _forever_." Sebastien smiled softly, drawing tired, bandaged fingers up and down her legs. Kelly snorted, and reached into her bag for another rag to clean the last knife with. Adalind sat, gingerly, three seats down from Kelly.

"Well," she began, "I've _just_ had a baby..."

Sebastien rasped out a laugh.

~*~*~*~

She stopped in front of her oven. She could feel the air changing, and she wrinkled her nose, trying to determine what was different.

"Sean," she sighed finally, reaching for the phone just before it began to ring. "Hello," she greeted the caller. "What's wrong today?"

"The mother of my child is flying into this city with two Grimms and my informant from Vienna." She knew that tone. It was the same one he used whenever he was under mass amounts of pressure and he needed somebody to be reliable and honest. He didn't use it often- in fact, she knew he only used it on her and his mother, which made her feel tired. The _mother of his child_ was the part that woke her spite. She knew this whole thing had been a mistake, but she didn't know _he_ thought it, too.

"I care about this why?" He laughed, and she smiled, sad and small and bitter.

"You don't." His voice cracked, just a little, and she wanted to roll her eyes again. He just couldn't let go of anything, Sean. He had to cling on and dig in his feet and never give up.

"Damn right," she snorted, turning off the timer before it could beep. "I have more important things to worry about." She pulled out the tray, not even bothering with the oven mitt. (It was really only there for appearance's sake.) Her flesh didn't burn.

"I know," he said, and she could hear the 'but' coming a mile away. " _But I need you_."

"You need me," she repeated, savoring the feel of the words. He needed her. Not her help, not her expertise. Just her. She probably would have assumed he'd done it on purpose if he wasn't such a control freak. He wasn't the kind of person to admit to needing anybody or anything. (Except her, apparently, but she was getting used to being the exception.)

"Well," she said, regaining her voice. "I guess that's just too bad."

She hung up.

She didn't regret it. She didn't _do_ regret. She did feel vaguely sick for a while, but she didn't regret it.

(She thinks she did. She doesn't remember regret very well.)

~*~*~*~

  
Nick was just beginning to fall asleep over his desk when the Captain stormed out of his office.

"I'm alive!" He said, straightening up.

"Yeah you are," Hank said judgementally, tossing a water bottle at his head. It was pure luck he caught it.

"You're taking the night shift?" The Captain asked, distractedly trying to pull on his coat.

"Yes sir. We're finishing the paperwork from the Fuller case," Hank said, allowing Nick to pull his eyes open long enough to nod.

"Good," he said, looking at them both, then at the door. "Good."

He swept out, looking harangued and absent. Hank and Nick shared a look.

It wasn't unusual for the Captain to be stressed, but for him to be this out of it?

"It is a girl?" Nick guessed, trying to remember what water tasted like.

"Who knows?" Hank shrugged, still following the Captain out with his eyes.

"Who cares?" Wu asked, the smell of bacon and maple syrup drifting in after him. "Anybody want pancakes? Julie in Forensics made some for research purposes, and she's giving them away."

  
~*~*~*~

"And then, he robbed me of my powers! It was so rude!" Adalind exclaimed, waving her hands at Lauren, who was still reclined across Sebastien's lap and was now stifling her laughter. Kelly was side-eyeing Adalind rather suspiciously.

"Well you kind of date-raped his partner," Lauren put forth, inspecting the end of her braid for split ends. "He _was_ somewhat justified in fighting you." Kelly raised an eyebrow at her. "What? I'm trying to be fair. I wouldn't say it was unprovoked, but it was also supposedly permanent, which seems like a little much." Kelly snorted and went back to sharpening a two-foot machete she'd pulled out from under her seat.

"Not much fun on long flights, are you?" Sebastien observed with a wry smile, wincing at the stretch to his skin.

"Wait until she starts making crossbow bolts," Lauren told him, " _That_ was a great trip to Switzerland."

"I ended up using them, didn't I?" Kelly said. Adalind inched a bit further from her. "It was justified."

"Everything's justified with you," Lauren muttered good-naturedly. She slid off of Sebastien and stretched, her fingertips brushing across the ceiling. "I'm going to go check on the pilot," she said, drawing one hand over Sebastien's shoulder. He nodded, and she left.

"So..." Adalind broke the silence, ever-present baby in her arms. "Is she your girlfriend or something?" Kelly smiled and bit her lip.

"No," Sebastien said, with more dignity than any man high on painkillers, covered in dried blood and still suspiciously bruised all over should be able to muster. "Not exactly."

"Well," Adalind asked, mouth pursed and eyebrows drawn, "Who the hell is she then?"

"She's a Grimm," Kelly said, drawing her whetstone down her blade with a bit more force than was probably necessary. "One of the nicer ones, too." Adalind drew herself up and in, like a muscle contracting. "She's more likely to ask questions,  _then_ kill you," Kelly grimaced, her distaste for this diplomacy showing. "She's strange like that."

"Well don't go spilling all my secrets," Lauren huffed, skipping the last two steps down from the cockpit. "I think she knows enough, Kelly."

"Well, I just-" Adalind began, her 'I'm-so-innocent' smile firmly in place.

"Or do you want my birthday and middle name, too?" Lauren was almost eye-to-eye with Adalind, letting the Hexenbiest see the lack of levity in her eyes, the sweet, easy girl from before gone like a breeze in the wind. "I'm not harmless, Adalind." She said carefully. "I'm just not out to harm you."

"Enough," Sebastien said, and Lauren stepped back. "We have a job to do."

"So we do," Lauren said, her carefree demeanor pulled around her like a shield once more. "Pilot says we've got ten more hours, so we should get some sleep while we can." The last part she directed at Sebastien, who stood to let her pull some blankets from the storage hold.

Adalind was still standing, clutching her baby closely and trying very hard not to look away from the second Grimm.

"Green or blue?" Lauren asked with a smile, holding up the two choices.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I like cupcake girl, but i feel like she deserves a better nickname. Also, Sebastien is still my baby, and I am still mad.


End file.
